titus, a brutal warrior, cut off the city's food and water in an attempt to starve the people out. >> to defeat jewish faction, he let the internal revolutionaries fight the battle for him. >> titus and his troops then breached the walls of jerusalem. they attacked the temple, slaughtering more than half a million jews with sword, fire, and crucifixion. >> the temple mount was a huge area. could you fit 40 american football fields inside the temple mount within the walls. much of it was plated with gold and with fine wood, and so from a distance, it would sparkle. >> every single jew had an obligation to make three pilgrimages a year to the temple in jerusalem, and people who lived in judea felt that obligation very seriously. the idea of pilgrimage was central to a jew's identity. >> the temple's majesty and its importance to the jews made it the perfect target for the romans to make clear exactly who was the king of the jews. rome. so the romans burned the temple to the ground, and titus and his men seized the spoils of war. >> the gold was melted down. the silver was melted down, a